DESCRIPTION OF THE EXPEDITION. AT 
but there is fortunately a small Government Reserve at the north-east end, where the 
Orient Line formerly had its coaling-sheds. Previously it consisted of about half a dozen 
properties, the central stations of most of which are only marked now by clumps of 
“bonnet carré” (Barringtonia speciosa), the large square seeds of which are used for 
burning and for salad. Its population numbers about six hundred, and there are 
enough “enfants des iles” to make the importation of labour unnecessary. The latter 
are a fine sturdy race, but they have only recently been attaining to ideas of western 
decency, and we met a party working in the bush in puwris naturalibus, who had 
apparently as yet little idea as to civilised requirements. 
Collections from the barachois were the objects of our special attention, the fauna and 
Fig. 19. 
Entrance of Barachois Silvain near Horsburgh Point, and lagoon of Diego Garcia. 
flora elsewhere being very similar to those of the other Chagos atolls. One we found to 
be barred up and used as a pond for fish, being full of mullet, but the rest were open to 
the lagoon. Their entrances are all relatively small, but inside they open out with horns 
branching off in every direction ; the whole is fringed with tall coco-palms. At high 
water all parts are covered, but at low tide they form vast expanses of glaring white sand 
or mud, with perhaps shallow streams in their centres. ‘They are evidently growing, 
dead and fallen coconuts fringing their sides, soon to be buried by the Cardiosoma crabs, 
whose immense holes and heaps of soil give a rough appearance to the ground. On the 
flats, too, which are regularly covered by the tide, any coral-mass or stone is as quickly 
buried by Uca. These interesting crabs burrow as near to each other as worms in our 
